Job 29:2

29:2 “O that I could be as I was

in the months now gone,

in the days when God watched over me,

Job 32:3

32:3 With Job’s three friends he was also angry, because they could not find an answer, and so declared Job guilty.

Job 40:4

40:4 “Indeed, I am completely unworthy – how could I reply to you?

I put 10  my hand over my mouth to silence myself. 11 

Job 42:15

42:15 Nowhere in all the land could women be found who were as beautiful as Job’s daughters, and their father granted them an inheritance alongside their brothers.


tn The optative is here expressed with מִי־יִתְּנֵנִי (mi-yittÿneni, “who will give me”), meaning, “O that I [could be]…” (see GKC 477 §151.b).

tn The preposition כּ (kaf) is used here in an expression describing the state desired, especially in the former time (see GKC 376 §118.u).

tn The expression is literally “months of before [or of old; or past].” The word קֶדֶם (qedem) is intended here to be temporal and not spatial; it means days that preceded the present.

tn The construct state (“days of”) governs the independent sentence that follows (see GKC 422 §130.d): “as the days of […] God used to watch over me.”

tn The imperfect verb here has a customary nuance – “when God would watch over me” (back then), or “when God used to watch over me.”

tn Heb “his”; the referent (Job) has been specified in the translation to indicate whose friends they were.

tn The perfect verb should be given the category of potential perfect here.

tc This is one of the eighteen “corrections of the scribes” (tiqqune sopherim); it originally read, “and they declared God [in the wrong].” The thought was that in abandoning the debate they had conceded Job’s point.

tn The word קַלֹּתִי (qalloti) means “to be light; to be of small account; to be unimportant.” From this comes the meaning “contemptible,” which in the causative stem would mean “to treat with contempt; to curse.” Dhorme tries to make the sentence a conditional clause and suggests this meaning: “If I have been thoughtless.” There is really no “if” in Job’s mind.

10 tn The perfect verb here should be classified as an instantaneous perfect; the action is simultaneous with the words.

11 tn The words “to silence myself” are supplied in the translation for clarity.